Monday, May 30, 2016

I usually don’t make reference to
the same blog post or Facebook thread two days in a row, but y’all need to drop
everything and look at THISexcellent Facebook post and discussion that Vonnie is hosting. Right now. Because I guarantee you’ll see our history as women of African descent with new eyes.Vonnie’s post states in part:

I want to talk about how black women have had their femininity birthright taken from them and how we're punished for it. Barby Jayne and Ashleigh Brown sparked some thoughts in my mind about this as well as the tahitian dancing post I shared earlier.

Where are the African Geisha-types? Courtesans? Nothing about us was ever lauded by bm to the world as a feminine ideal; we've always been betrayed and used as warriors and work mules. How many books/movies/poems have been done about the "pretty prostitute/mistress/courtesan/geisha" in ancient times or now? how many were about BLACK women being the ultimate in feminine sex appeal? Where are our sonnets/odes/epic poems/literature? The Middle East, Asia, and Europe have countless impressive and well known texts dedicated to their women's beauty and femininity, wars were waged in their women's honor, art was created solely to praise their beauty....once again, where's ours? Has no one ever thought about that? . . . [ ]

. . . [ ] Our femininity was never appreciated or emphasized and now we're demonized as hard, angry, mean....where they do that at?

As one commenter named Fatou stated on that thread—and she brought receipts:

Fatou DiarraThis is on point. I was discussing this with my cousin from my Ghanaian side and she concurred 100 percent. Even at the museum..we noticed African art forms display carvings with their women carrying loads, breast hanging down, and naked..whereas, the Greco Roman art always displayed their women in the best light..hair well done..posing..robed. It is very apparent that African men didnt value or celebrate femininity in their own women. This is some of the reason why foreigners perceive the African woman to be unprotected and just "out there"..and why black men have an obsession with chasing nonblack women from ancient times..e.g. Moors..it is the femininity of the nonblack woman that draws them..but celebrated and preserved by her men. My cousin even pointed out that in love songs made in Ghana..a term of endearment is "me obroni"..meaning my fair skinned woman or my white lady.

The same dynamic applies to African dances--as another commenter (Cree Skylark) on one of Vonnie's posts, pointed out, even the traditional African dances that folks try to
cajole African-American women into celebrating are MASCULINE war dances. I never made that
connection before, but she’s absolutely right. Those African dances mostly look like AA
fraternity step show stomping. Which is why I could never relate to that African dance stuff
when I took dance classes as a teenager. All that African stuff looks mucho
macho!Just compare THIS:To this Maori wedding haka (which is traditionally a WAR dance):

And to this original haka:

And to these African gumboot dancers:

VERSUS this flamenco dancer. I picked
flamenco because it involves percussive foot tapping. But notice how this
dancer’s feminine silhouette is being emphasized and celebrated in most of her
movements. As opposed to stomping around like a male warrior or male miner.

Now that you’ve seen this mess lined up in a row,
reread Fatou’s comment:

Fatou DiarraThis is on point. I was discussing this with my cousin from my Ghanaian side and she concurred 100 percent. Even at the museum..we noticed African art forms display carvings with their women carrying loads, breast hanging down, and naked..whereas, the Greco Roman art always displayed their women in the best light..hair well done..posing..robed. It is very apparent that African men didnt value or celebrate femininity in their own women. This is some of the reason why foreigners perceive the African woman to be unprotected and just "out there"..and why black men have an obsession with chasing nonblack women from ancient times..e.g. Moors..it is the femininity of the nonblack woman that draws them..but celebrated and preserved by her men. My cousin even pointed out that in love songs made in Ghana..a term of endearment is "me obroni"..meaning my fair skinned woman or my white lady.

When you look at these cultural artifacts, it’s
obvious that everything in that historical African surrounding was about
grooming Black women to be exploited as mules, work horses and she-male warriors.

Mules and she-male warriors whose primary
purpose has always been to be pimped by adult Black males.

Ladies, it’s long past time for African-American women to
stop worrying about any of that “Black stuff” and learn how to use
feminine skills to their advantage.

Saturday, May 28, 2016

I would strongly urge every African-American Black
woman to read and give careful thought to Vonnie’s excellent recent Facebook postHERE, which states, in part:

I want to talk about how black women have had their femininity birthright taken from them and how we're punished for it. Barby Jayne and Ashleigh Brown sparked some thoughts in my mind about this as well as the tahitian dancing post I shared earlier.

Where are the African Geisha-types? Courtesans? Nothing about us was ever lauded by bm to the world as a feminine ideal; we've always been betrayed and used as warriors and work mules. How many books/movies/poems have been done about the "pretty prostitute/mistress/courtesan/geisha" in ancient times or now? how many were about BLACK women being the ultimate in feminine sex appeal? Where are our sonnets/odes/epic poems/literature? The Middle East, Asia, and Europe have countless impressive and well known texts dedicated to their women's beauty and femininity, wars were waged in their women's honor, art was created solely to praise their beauty....once again, where's ours? Has no one ever thought about that? . . . [ ]

. . . [ ] Our femininity was never appreciated or emphasized and now we're demonized as hard, angry, mean....where they do that at? What other way would bw be? When a black girl child IS feminine, she's told to toughen up and accept/want struggle.....when she expresses her feminine sexuality, she's a dirty thot and sexually assaulted (to the tune of over 60% of black girls under the age of 18) and so gets used to her sexuality being devalued and free to all (we don't even cherish black virgins like in every other culture, just assume that all are hoes with a bunch of baby daddies). There are no quinceaneras to celebrate our ascent into womanhood, no cotillions or balls, barely get to go to prom.

Then as adults the great irony in life is that black men turn around and chase OTHER women for being feminine because they haven't set up the environment EVER for bw to be so. Ashleigh Brown noted: "You ever notice how bm only want women that other men worked to preserve their femininityIe. Non bwIe. Bw with non bm

I was watching a Korean talent show at nail shop and these women are afforded so much in regards to protection of their image. A lot of the songs men were singing was about love and marriage.

Similar issues were discussed in my post
Beauty As A Weapon and in the comments to that post. I would urge you to
check out that conversation if you haven’t already seen it.

I spoonfed specific “Beauty As A Weapon”-related resources in the premium content that
I reserved for those readers who were regular commenters on my blogs.

Those who value cultivating their beauty can find
similar resources on their own with a bit of effort.

Equality is not the same as uniformity. Men are not the same as women, and generally don’t have the same emotional priorities or needs. Often, nonverbal communication is superior to verbal communication. Actions say more than words. Indirect actions are often more useful in shaping other people’s behavior than direct confrontations.

I also believe that more modern Western women need to get it through their heads that acquiring and maintaining an attractive, feminine appearance works to their advantage. Instead of trying to pretend that men don’t respond differently to different women’s appearance. Or trying to browbeat men into pretending that they’re not visual creatures. That doesn’t work.

What happens is that men learn to stop talking in women’s presence about their preferences. Overall, this is a losing strategy for women.

. . . The point is for you to leverage these particular aspects of male psychology to your advantage!

. . . Ladies, take what’s useful from whatever source, and discard the rest. A woman having feminine skills plus 21st century freedom of movement (especially in the Western world) is an extremely powerful combination!